QuickBooks Online Accountant: Linking a New Client

QuickBooks Online Accountant links your practice to a client’s company file through an accountant invitation. Ask the client to invite your practice’s nominated account, accept it under the right firm and check the file before the first job.

What QuickBooks Online Accountant Gives a Practice

QuickBooks Online Accountant is Intuit’s workspace for accountants and bookkeepers to open client files and manage practice work. The client’s QuickBooks Online subscription holds their company’s books. Your accountant workspace gives your practice access to those books through its own account.

The client list is where you find a linked company and open its file. Inside the company, Accountant tools includes reclassification of transactions and GST codes. The Work view holds projects and tasks assigned to your team, such as reviewing opening balances before the first BAS.

Intuit’s Australian ProAdvisor page describes the accountant workspace as free to join. The client company’s subscription is billed separately. Agree who pays that subscription before creating a file or taking over its billing.

Some Australian help pages now use Intuit Accountant Suite and Firm hub for the practice workspace. Use the client list and team permissions for your account’s layout. For clients using Xero, follow the separate Xero practice access guide.

How a Client Invites Their Accountant

A client’s primary admin or company admin sends the accountant invitation from their own QuickBooks Online file. Give them the email address registered to your practice’s nominated accountant account. A shared mailbox only works for this purpose when it is the address attached to that account.

Put the nominated address in your onboarding message, together with the correct company name. Ask the client to use Accounting firms and invite your practice there. Explain that staff receive access through your practice account. Keep personal staff addresses out of the invitation instructions.

1. Ask the client to sign in to the correct QuickBooks Online company as an authorised admin.
2. Have them open Settings, then Manage users and Accounting firms.
3. Ask them to select Invite firm, enter the nominated address and save or send the invitation. Complete any prompted verification.
4. Open the invitation email and sign in with the practice’s QuickBooks Online Accountant account. Select the correct firm if prompted and accept.
5. Open Clients and select Client list. Find the company and open its QuickBooks icon. Ask the client to confirm your firm’s status is Active.

The client keeps their own login. Your practice never needs the client’s password to accept accountant access.

If the email does not arrive, compare the entered address with your accountant account and check the receiving mailbox’s junk folder. Ask the client to resend the invitation. If the invitation opens the wrong firm, sign out of other QuickBooks sessions and accept under the intended firm account.

QuickBooks access and ATO client-to-agent linking are separate steps. One does not complete the other.

Adding a Client Who is Not on QuickBooks Yet

Create the client’s company from your accountant workspace after agreeing the subscription payer and collecting the setup details. Use the bookkeeping onboarding checklist for the wider acceptance and document-collection work.

1. Open Clients and select Client list. Choose Add client.
2. Enter the client’s details and choose the product subscription for their company.
3. Select the billing arrangement during setup. Accountant-billed or wholesale billing makes your practice responsible for Intuit’s charges. Client billing makes the client responsible.
4. Complete the setup prompts, then open the company from the client list. Confirm its name and subscription payer before entering transactions.

A client who subscribes directly can instead create their company and send the accountant invitation described above. Taking over an existing subscription’s billing requires separate permission from the client’s primary admin. Accountant access alone does not authorise that transfer.

Confirm the following settings against the client’s onboarding records before the first transaction:

• Legal entity name and ABN, separate from any trading name.
• GST registration status and the registration start recorded for the business.
• GST cash or accrual basis, BAS period and the accounting basis used in reports.
• Financial year start and the opening-balance cut-over.
• Payroll status, payroll provider and who reports Single Touch Payroll (STP).

Intuit’s Australian setup guidance places company details under Settings, then Accounts and Settings. For an established GST setup, use GST, Overview, Settings and Tax Settings to check accounting method and lodging frequency.

If your practice creates the file as primary admin, agree the handover point with the client. Intuit now calls this role primary admin, which replaces the older master admin wording. The client needs ongoing control of their own company and access if they change accountants.

To hand over, sign in as the company’s primary admin and lead accountant. Open its Settings and Manage users, find the client and choose Make primary admin from Actions. Follow the transfer prompts and have the client accept the emailed link. Confirm the client holds the role and your practice still has accountant access.

First-Week Checks on an Inherited QuickBooks File

Check the inherited file against the last agreed accounts and lodged BAS before relying on its balances. An accountant invitation gives you access to the records, but those records can still contain earlier errors.

• Compare opening balances and the trial balance with the prior accounts. Include debtors, creditors and any loan balances.
• Check GST registration, basis and BAS frequency against the client’s records. Inspect tax codes and automatic bank rules on recurring transactions.
• Identify connected bank accounts, feeds that have stopped and accounts recorded in the books without a feed.
• Record the last closed period, outstanding reconciliations and who can change earlier transactions.
• Establish whether payroll and STP run in QuickBooks or another payroll product. Compare payroll balances with the handover records.

Employers must report through STP unless an exemption applies. STP sends employee tax and super information to the ATO through enabled software. Confirm any applicable exemption or deferral under the ATO’s STP reporting guidance. Keep payroll finalisation separate from granting access to the bookkeeping file.

Compare GST With the Last Lodged BAS

Run the GST reports for the last lodged quarter using the same basis and period as that BAS. Compare sales, GST on sales and GST on purchases with the lodged figures. Reconcile differences to documented adjustments, payments and changes made after lodgement.

In a hypothetical inherited file, a recurring bank rule assigns GST to every insurance payment. The previous bookkeeper’s coding then carries into the next BAS. Inspect the invoices and the rule before changing transactions. Record any prior-period correction separately from the current-period work.

Compare entity details with the checked client form as well. Tax Genie checks ABNs against the Australian Business Register and reviews answers with rules and AI. Its corrected entity and GST details give your practice a reference for comparing the QuickBooks settings. A registration mismatch needs resolution before you use those settings for a BAS.

Use the BAS preparation checklist to organise the records needed for each reporting period.

Connect and Reconcile the Bank Feed

Match the client’s Australian bank and account type against Intuit’s bank connection status page. Arrange any required data-sharing delegate with the bank. Authority to operate an account and authority to share its data are different permissions.

1. Open Accounting and select Bank transactions. Choose Connect account or Link account.
2. Select the bank. Have the authorised client complete the bank’s consent and sign-in steps themselves.
3. Select the business accounts and map each feed to its existing chart-of-accounts account.
4. Choose an import start after the last transactions already recorded, then connect. Check the account tile and downloaded transactions.

Reconcile the first downloaded statement period before accepting the feed as ready. Compare the opening and closing balances with the bank statement. Investigate duplicate entries, missing transactions and disconnected accounts. Match downloaded transactions to entries already in the file before adding new ones.

If an account is missing during authorisation, check the business banking profile and data-sharing delegation. Use a statement import when a feed is unavailable. Document its cut-over and import range so a later feed does not duplicate that period.

Managing Team Access in the Accountant Account

Give each staff member their own account and access only to the clients they work on. Your practice’s nominated invitation address does not mean everyone shares its password.

1. Sign in as a practice admin. Open Firm hub, Manage users and Users. The older layout uses Team.
2. Select Add user and enter the staff member’s own name and work email.
3. Assign their firm role and client access. Select only the client files they need, then send the invitation.
4. Have the staff member accept and confirm they can open the assigned company. Review their client access when their duties change.

When a staff member leaves, open the same user list, select their Actions menu and Delete, then confirm Delete user. Do this on their departure day. Review each client’s own Manage users list for any separate direct invitation that bypasses the firm account, and remove that access too.

Sharing one accountant login makes the audit record show that account instead of the staff member who changed the books. Individual accounts preserve a useful record and let you remove one person without disrupting everyone else.

QuickBooks Online Accountant Training and ProAdvisor

QuickBooks ProAdvisor is Intuit’s program for product training and certification. Its Australian page includes self-paced training and certification through QuickBooks Online Accountant without a separate joining charge.

For onboarding staff, start with client access and file setup. Follow with banking, transaction coding and reports. Staff handling payroll also need training in that payroll product and its STP reporting steps. Use a training company to practise these tasks before working in a client file.

A ProAdvisor certificate demonstrates vendor product knowledge. TPB registration is a separate requirement for providing regulated tax or BAS services. Before counting training hours, apply the TPB’s continuing professional education guidance. The activity must relate to the services you provide and come from a suitably qualified or experienced provider. The TPB does not accredit individual CPE activities.

Keep the course outline, completion evidence and relevant hours in your CPE record. Finish onboarding by recording that the correct company opens, the client controls their admin account and the assigned staff have access. The file is ready for the first job once its settings and opening records reconcile with the handover evidence.